A quick glance at social media and it looks like everyone else is living a fairy tale life. We are all off globe trotting, staying in luxury places, trying new foods, going on sweet dates and attending parties. We have a tendency to image craft our lives, project out to the world a picture perfect image that is not a realistic portrayal at all. I share a lot of my life on social media and online. I love to tell stories, take photos and share my adventures. I try to be honest and authentic but at the same time, I can probably make a simple trip to the shops to buy apples look like an amazing journey.
That is all well and good but an over saturation of fairy tales lives can lead to envy and comparison. People respond to 'look how dreamy my life is' stories, because we all want THAT dreamy life. I think people are equally drawn to stories that contain gritty reality. Headlines like 'Celebrities Without Makeup' seems to sell magazines. We want to see that others have bad hair days just to feel that our lives are normal.
But there is a distinct lack of praise for normality.
Today I want to tell you that your life is good how it is.
You are not boring.
You are not missing out.
You are interesting because life is interesting
I was talking to my Dad last night and something he said really stood out to me. He was lamenting about how his ancestors did not leave any diaries. He had to piece together the family tree and glean as much as he could about his family history based on scrap notes, photos and memorabilia. He said he would have loved to discover a diary, not filled with glamours tales of adventure and misfortune but filled with a realistic daily account of what their lives were like back then. Then Dad said:
“We might not find the daily little boring details of our lives interesting but our future generations probably will.”
Boring, average, normal, mundane, nothing much, life's daily little grind is filled with incredibly interesting things already. We just need to open our eyes to life. Stop flying by, looking for the next great shot for Instagram and trying to sell your life like a Hollywood movie. You don't need to travel, go to parties or embark on a perilous journey to prove your self worth in this world. Do those things if you want to (and yes you can do those things if you set your mind to it). But the point is, you don't have to do those things. There is nothing boring about you.
Today I was lucky to have a child free day off. I did nothing much at all and I still think it makes a good story. Not because I can image craft the heck out of my photos or only share the whimsical parts. Because it is my life and the inherent nature of that is interesting.
So is yours.
I will leave you with this adorable quote
“After all," Anne had said to Marilla once, "I believe the nicest and sweetest days are not those on which anything very splendid or wonderful or exciting happens but just those that bring simple little pleasures, following one another softly, like pearls slipping off a string.” - L.M Montgomery, Anne of Avonlea
Until next time,
xx Isabella
It's the moments we lament in our youth that we seek in our maturity. I love your perspective, and this Monday affirmation that existence itself is interesting.
And yeah, that Apple buy did seem more epic haha
Aww thanks @prufarchy - a lovely way to put it "Monday affirmation that existence itself is interesting"
haha @condra. I had written 3 full pages but decided to cut out so much of it and get to the point of what I was thinking. I can ramble on at times.
What a beautiful ethos you have on life , thanks for sharing your day with us. And everyone is interesting in there own way , maybe not to everyone but you cant expect to appeal to everyone all the time. I suppose that is what makes things interesting.
You are most welcome @willbeonceagain. You are right that not everyones life will have broad appeal all the time.
Awesome!!!
Usually, I photographed every day, but today is very cloudy and not pleasant to be out :))
That is awesome. I try to take lots of photos of my daily activities too. I have a bit of an ongoing cloud storage issue because of it, but it makes for a nice visual diary.
I meant to say that is awesome you take daily photos, not that it is awesome the day was unpleasant :)
It is ok :)) each weather is good take a picture, but the mood is what it ruin.
I totally agree with you that life is not all that exciting full of adventures like most posts on the platform. Your article makes you a real person that everyone can relate to themselves in daily life.
Thanks for reading @rea. I think as I put so much of myself out there, I need to be real, at least for my own sake.
Social media has created a culture where people feel the need to one-up each other. I can think of all sorts of examples of this: taking the most exotic travel photos to get the high of 100+ likes, moms throwing lavish birthday parties for their kids so that they can take photos to prove to their friends that they're the best "supermom", I could go on.
It's easy to lose yourself in all of this, join the stupid competition and forget to live your life for yourself and those you love. I think we need to praise normality a bit more and it's great to see posts like this that do that exact thing.
Very true. It is easy to lose yourself in it all. I stopped watching commercial TV years ago because I decided that advertising agencies paid millions to know how to crack through to me and even if I thought I wasn't being affected by advertising - I was. I think the same thing goes with social media, you can see 'image crafting' in action, know it exists, think we are not affected by it, but we are.
I love the amazing photo's. I love it when people see beauty in simple things others take for granted.
So do I @thegoldencookie. Thanks for stopping by and taking the time to read my post.
Touching. Nicely said. I happen to be having obe of those peaceful, quiet days.
How wonderful for you @mombasa. I hope the rest of your peaceful day was lovely.
well said.
thank you for stopping by to read @ilanaakoundi
We don't give enough credit to those moments we rarely get to ourselves to just be. Thanks for the reminder and thanks for sharing.
You are welcome @comealong. Yes indeed. I must say I really enjoyed my quiet day of nothing yesterday. Back to the twin girl tornadoes this morning.
Pleasant Monday night read @bridgetbunchy . Well said that people tend not to praise normality. We now live in digital world and just want everything this minute with no effort, bombarded by someone else's picture perfect lives and don't appreciate our own 'ordinary' existence. Many of us are joining the rat race..so thanks @bridgetbunchy for a reminder of slowing down and take in the moment to enjoy that favourite cup of tea or warmth of woollen socks when you're feet is icy cold.
Good luck with your Steemit adventure!
Good morning from Australia. Thanks for the up vote @inna